九個窟窿 Nine Holes In His Head
你看他斂衣纏鈀，使分水法，跳將下去，徑至那牌樓下。發聲喊，打入殿內。此時那龍子披了麻，看著龍屍哭；龍孫與那駙馬，在後面收拾棺材哩。這八戒罵上前，手起處，鈀頭著重，把個龍子夾腦連頭，一鈀築了九個窟窿。諕得那龍婆與眾往裡亂跑，哭道：「長嘴和尚又把我兒打死了。」你看他敛衣缠钯，使分水法，跳将下去，径至那牌楼下。发声喊，打入殿内。此时那龙子披了麻，看着龙尸哭；龙孙与那驸马，在后面收拾棺材哩。这八戒骂上前，手起处，钯头着重，把个龙子夹脑连头，一钯筑了九个窟窿。諕得那龙婆与众往里乱跑，哭道：「长嘴和尚又把我儿打死了。」
逐句解 Line by line
See him gather his robe and grip his rake, work the water-parting spell, go leaping down and straight to the foot of the ceremonial arch.
跳將下去 takes 將 as the vernacular verbal infix, jiāng, which gives the leap its headlong quality. 看 is kàn and 分 is fēn; 鈀 is pá. 你看他 is the storyteller turning to the audience, and the English keeps the address.
He gave a shout and went smashing into the hall.
No graph in this segment stands in any guard roster. Seven graphs, a short narrator's clause, standing alone on grammar — the fifth of its kind in the chapter. It is also a near-repeat of what he did the first time he broke into this hall, in almost the same words.
By now the dragon sons had put on hemp and were weeping over the dragon's body; the dragon grandsons and the son-in-law were behind, getting the coffin ready.
The two members are rejoined here across the semicolon that divides them: one sentence in strictly parallel halves, near-equal in length, showing two parts of one household at the same moment, with nothing building between them. 看著 takes the durative 著 zhe; 龍子 takes 子 at zǐ; 哩 stands at li.
Eight Rules came cursing forward, and where his hand fell the rake-head landed heavy: it took a dragon son square across the skull and drove nine holes through his head at one stroke.
著 at 鈀頭著重 is zhuó, the contact reading — the head of the rake makes contact, and makes it with weight. 處 is chù, the point at which; 重 is zhòng, weight; 龍子 again zǐ. 一鈀 takes 一 at yì, and the value holds whether the following graph is read at its base or at its ruling.
It so terrified the dragon dame and the rest that they ran scattering inward, and she cried, "The long-snouted monk has killed my son too!"
諕 stands at xià by the invariant ruling and 諕得 takes the linking 得 de — the fourth and last occurrence of this graph in the chapter. 兒 at 我兒 is ér, the animate noun-morpheme, not the retroflex suffix the chapter has used three times elsewhere. 長 is cháng.
What Eight Rules breaks into is a funeral. The text sets it out before he arrives: sons in hemp weeping over the body, grandsons and the son-in-law out the back with the coffin. The household is doing exactly what Eight Rules predicted the evening before that it would be doing, which was his argument for not attacking at all.
The killing is described by its mechanics. The hand comes down, the rake-head lands with weight, the blow takes a dragon son across the skull, and the count is nine holes. It is the same rake and the same arithmetic the novel always gives it, and it is being used on a mourner.
The dragon dame's cry is the only line in the chapter spoken by anyone on the losing side that is not a boast, a deposition or a threat. 又 — too, again — carries the whole of it: her husband on the bank of the pool yesterday, her son on the floor of the hall now. She is not addressing anyone.